Slipknot Featured in BBC Series About Artists Wearing Masks

Slipknot have become one of extreme music's biggest success stories. Frontman Corey Taylor is seemingly everywhere on TV from lending his guttural roar to an alien warlord on Doctor Who to being featured as a hint on the quiz show Jeopardy about his voiceover on thepopular series. Now, Taylor and bandmate Shawn 'Clown' Crahan are set to appear on Artsnight tonight (Feb. 5) at 11PM (6 PM ET) on BBC2 in an episode on mask-wearing musicians.

The two will bring viewers back to the very beginning of Slipknot and when the band implemented the masks as part of their visual concept. In the video preview above, Taylor and Clown talk about the origins of their masks and Taylor even tells the story of when he saw Slipknot for the first time before he was in the band. He recalled, "It was so many different things all at once. It was visual, it was visceral, it was antagonistic, it was dangerous, it was powerful. I'd never seen a band like that before. It was taking everything that had been done creatively, artistically, visually and, to me, taking it to such a different realm. And I loved the fact that every mask was different, because it represented a different person."

He went on to describe what wearing a mask means for him personally, adding, “The mask, for me, has always been that physical representation of the person inside me who just never had a voice. It allows me to be me. I mean, that’s what it’s all about. You talk about that representation of the person on the inside. I’m showing you more than I’ve ever revealed."

These words followed Clown's after he revealed why he chose the circus character as his alter ego, stating, "I had gotten a version of this mask when I was 14. I was drawn to it, it was awesome. I just never knew why it was in my world and it was always around me. Then one day there was this moment of clarity about what I wanted to project. I'm being taught something, more and more, and I haven't even figured it out yet. This thing has no f--king limits."

Slipknot have been nominated for a Grammy award for Best Metal Performance for the song "Custer" off their 2014 release, .5: The Gray Chapter. Taylor has expressed his thoughts towards winning another gramophone, stating, "I don’t have f–king time for that s–t, to be honest.”

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